Indeed. I find it hard to tell whether Incubus’ flesh has betrayed him, and he is grimacing in pain, or his spirit is the betrayer, and envy of the Rising King twists his lip.
New WoG is that Incubus is also a Head of John practitioner(that’s what the nails to either side of his Key are from), so on top of the durability granted by the Key, his head is also nigh indestructible.
So either Allison has gotten immensely more powerful than what we’ve seen in the waking world, or Inky let her cut him.
We’ve seen her use the Blade of Want before and the Tend Cubit Spear seems to have a similar composition. Is it possible either of those are just able to defeat Head of John well enough to cause at least minor damage?
Given his mastery of Head of John and the corresponding cranial durability, it seems unlikely Allison could truly damage his cheek. I believe this “wound” to be a deception by Incubus. He is one of the Seven in a dreamworld of his crafting. Nothing can be taken at face value.
It’s a version of the moffereffin Blade of Want. I’m pretty sure its description includes a line which says “ignores ALL defensive techniques, powers, abilities, items, or buffs of any kind, no exceptions”.
The Tree of Woe was the most valuable possession of Mottom- the most powerful sorceress in all the multiverse (except maybe Jadis in her prime). I’m sure the enchantments that protected that tree were the Head of John several times over.
To attain enlightenment you must seek after Sophia and forswear the lustful urges of the world. That said, many an adept has attained enlightenment and decided lustful urges aren’t so bad…
Incubus IS the lustful urge of the world. Heed not his lying words. Cast off the pleasing chains wherein he binds the hearts of men to his consumption. Avoid destruction.
Nay! Reject the sterile circularity as YISUN did. Instead of casting off the sublime cancer of form and desire, break it and yoke it to your Will. Base desires may be enslaved serve the Exalted.
So, White Chain teaches her to be controlled, and Incubus teaches her to be uncontrolled. Makes sense, she’ll need both. I wonder how much either is aware of the other’s work.
I wonder too. “As we practiced!” Incubus said. Can White Chain not know that Allison has a Ten Cubit Spear? It would produce a mighty bulge in her shorts…
Its why I counsel up and coming fighters to seek out devils to teach them.
If they survive the experience they are no doubt going to be powerful beyond measure, for they understand that the battlefield, like their training, is chaos and only a fool attempts to bring that chaos completely under control through over reliance on technique.
’tis the wisdom of the Knights Belligerent for the student to slay the master, or for them to at least aspire to do so. They treat this serial treachery as a form of refinement, removing impurities in their lineage’s technique with each generation usurped. The masters are correspondingly brutal, so as to safeguard their tradition from being polluted by inferiors. Truly, this results in one of the most rewarding teacher-student relationships i’ve ever had the pleasure of witnessing(and subsequently corrupting and devouring).
I recall from my days as a banker that there exists a regulation in certain localities requiring a license for the possession and use of kneecaps, and said license may be revoked at the discretion of any local or multiversal authority (such as myself, who governed fiefdoms in several universes of the Great Wheel).
I still may yet have the authority to revoke such a license, and enforce the confiscation of the licensed materials.
Hush Draco, you may have the legal power to do so, but I know for a fact that you can’t afford the proper bureaucratic bribes necessary to enforce that authority.
Yeah, my first thought was that it’s no wonder her wounds have never healed but scarred instead, if she still projects them in her dreamscape and sweats her essence through them. Her body would have needed a full rest, including in her deep sleep, for them to heal.
I SEE YOU SURVIVED, BEANCOUNTER, DESPITE THE VIOLENCE I VISITED UPON YOU WHEN LAST WE MET. TRUTHFULLY, I THOUGHT YOU WOULD. IT SEEMS THE MEMORY OF THE NOBLE METALS THAT ONCE PERVADED YOUR FORM HAVE NOT YET LEFT YOU, EVEN IF THE METAL ITSELF HAS.
IT SEEMS YOUR WORDS FROM WHEN WE LAST SPOKE MIGHT RING MORE TRUE THAN EITHER OF US REALIZED.
Joubes Draco, Elevator Thief, Former Banker, Residual Organism
I’m afraid death and I are, and will remain, loose acquaintances at best. But it was not the memory of my precious blood that allowed my survival; rather my continued existence (I refuse to call it “life” at this point) is owed to my lowliness.
You left me in a wretched state, unrecognizable as a living thing. But fool that you are, you failed to notice that, in fact, this is just what I look like all the time. I escaped death by feigning total annihilation! If only by the skin of my eyeballs, I still yet draw breath, and I shall continue to steal in this elevator! Joubes Draco, former Regional Manager at the Bank of the Grand Dragon, may be destroyed, but he shall not die!
I offer you my humble greeting Joubes Draco, esteemed ex Bank Manager. In response to your earlier enquiry, Idiot is my calling and Idiot indeed i am.
I am certain that a banker such as yourself, even after dismissal and in somewhat reduced straits, would have no interest of any kind in my recent misfortune regarding missing lift cages, nor of the revelations of my subsequent investigations, namely that a number of ‘recently retired’ elevator cars and a quantity of good cable were recently received at the premises of one H King, dealer in scrap metal and general recycling, sold by a somewhat down at heel individual who, some days earlier had offered a quantity of molten gold heavily contaminated with spent black glass and of disappointingly inferior quality.
No, i am sure none of this is of any interest to you and i shall trouble you no further on this matter as you doubtless have other, more pressing concerns to attend to, having just publicly referred to a Knight of the Thorns as a fool.
If I’m guessing right, in this wee-little-bit-symbolic place one drop of blood is no different than one gallon, and not in the “draw first blood” sense.
Then there is the little matter of her marring his perfect pretty face. That could be even worse! These ARE ego fights, no?
I wonder about that. Incubus certainly *seems* vain enough, but his real face is also heavily scared and it doesn’t seem like he’s done anything to correct or hide that. I suspect at least part of his vanity is an act, to mislead and misdirect.
Pree Al-YISUN’s instructors consist of a continuous nuclear explosion in a suit of ash armor, a fragment of fundamental chaos that lies to the multiverse so well that reality capitulates to her untruths, and an interdimensional overlord glam god.
Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely…but it does not *have* to. Power is not an end, but a means. Power for power’s sake will ultimately break the wielder.
Why seek power? To answer this question, the wise man first asks “why do we fight?” The wise man knows that the evil ones fight because they can; the evil ones fight to gain power over others and to exalt themselves forevermore. The evil ones never realize until it is too late that sacrificing all they have for power means that in the end, their selves is all they will ever have left. The more you take, the less you have. This is the Paradox of Power.
But the good ones know why they fight: for home, for family, for peace. They do not seek to exalt themselves, they only wish to make sure their loved ones are safe. When the good people go to war, their souls are at peace. This is the Paradox of War.
The wise ones remember what the Bhodisattva of War Sun Tzu said. “If you wish for peace, you must prepare for war. And you must always remember that the true object of war is peace.” This is the Paradox of Peace.
The wise ones also know that if you do not know yourself nor your enemy, you will succumb in every battle. If you know yourself, but not your enemy, then for every victory you gain, you shall also suffer a defeat. It is only by knowing yourself and your enemy that you will prevail in every battle. This is the Paradox of Self.
This humble Censor shall add one further commentary to this discourse on Power. Why does Power drive the souls of the unwise and self-center mad, rendering them as intractable as rabid dogs?
The sage Orwell once observed that the worst Tyrants seek power for the sake of power…and that the surest way to demonstrate your power over others is to make them suffer.
This then, is the sweet poison that makes the powerful believe that kindness is foul and cruelty good…for even the mightiest of Deitarchs cannot know for sure that their power is unrivaled. When a rival or threat appears, it tears at their hearts. Are they stronger than me? Are they quick in thought or flesh? What Words of Power do they ken?
Their agitated minds cannot rest until they break their rivals in spirit, stamping their faces into the dirt, soothing themselves for a time with the narcotic mantra “Still, I am Supreme.”
And yet Wheel is vast and lit by trillions of little Flames––too many for even the fiercest Demiurge to test, break and control. Thus the forces of Evil never rest, never lie at ease. By using their power to enslave others, thus they become Power’s slave–the Paradox of Power spoken of by the Lawgiver.
What then, would happen if a consciousness knew, deep down, that they were the strongest? If they knew deep down, without any doubt, that no Animal in the Kingdom could ever strike them down?
Such a being may not be wise, or noble, or even clever…but their hearts would bear no hatred or envy, their minds no fevered schemes. They would treat their power as a mere trifle, and reach out to the hearts of others without fear of being hurt by rejection or betrayal.
This would be the mark of true Royalty, expressed through many facets…an Absolute Power that does not corrupt, but rather purifies and brings Absolution.
Hm, first blood. Now is the question, did he plan that? Looks rather surprised I’d say….
Indeed. I find it hard to tell whether Incubus’ flesh has betrayed him, and he is grimacing in pain, or his spirit is the betrayer, and envy of the Rising King twists his lip.
I am of a divided mind. One the one hand, can we trust anything that Incubus chooses to show Allison in dreams?
On the other hand, honesty exceeds deceit as a tool of subtle violence.
New WoG is that Incubus is also a Head of John practitioner(that’s what the nails to either side of his Key are from), so on top of the durability granted by the Key, his head is also nigh indestructible.
So either Allison has gotten immensely more powerful than what we’ve seen in the waking world, or Inky let her cut him.
We’ve seen her use the Blade of Want before and the Tend Cubit Spear seems to have a similar composition. Is it possible either of those are just able to defeat Head of John well enough to cause at least minor damage?
Head of John used by a regular practitioner perhaps. Head of John used by one of The Seven, perhaps not.
Given his mastery of Head of John and the corresponding cranial durability, it seems unlikely Allison could truly damage his cheek. I believe this “wound” to be a deception by Incubus. He is one of the Seven in a dreamworld of his crafting. Nothing can be taken at face value.
It’s a version of the moffereffin Blade of Want. I’m pretty sure its description includes a line which says “ignores ALL defensive techniques, powers, abilities, items, or buffs of any kind, no exceptions”.
The Tree of Woe was the most valuable possession of Mottom- the most powerful sorceress in all the multiverse (except maybe Jadis in her prime). I’m sure the enchantments that protected that tree were the Head of John several times over.
Nobody makes him bleed his own blood!
And Nobody will blind him
Buy he will blind Nobodies and show them what he wants. Or what they want.
If it bleeds, we can kill it
This is axiomatic
Aye, this is true. The question is: did she actually make him bleed? Or is it merely illusion?
Trick question. EVERYTHING is an illusion, because YISUN is a prodigious liar.
Demiurge? If she works at it she could become a whole Urge.
As a scholar, I must inform you that her muscles fill me and my sisters with urges.
To attain enlightenment you must seek after Sophia and forswear the lustful urges of the world. That said, many an adept has attained enlightenment and decided lustful urges aren’t so bad…
Incubus IS the lustful urge of the world. Heed not his lying words. Cast off the pleasing chains wherein he binds the hearts of men to his consumption. Avoid destruction.
Nay! Reject the sterile circularity as YISUN did. Instead of casting off the sublime cancer of form and desire, break it and yoke it to your Will. Base desires may be enslaved serve the Exalted.
The Grail permits other options. In the case of Librarian, perhaps in the name of Flowermaker.
The first Forbidden Acts of the Forge of Days unquestionably contained much Glory.
What if one has lustful urges towards Sophia?
Now I wonder… if he gets hurt in dream realm, does it still damage his body in Throne?
I suspect it depends on who does the hurting, but have no reliable frame of reference for what may be when two of the great keys are involved.
‘xcept fear itself
Ooo, she nearly had his ear off with that !
Having the ear of one of the seven rulers of the universe is an impressive feat indeed. Truly the Rising King has risen far indeed.
So, White Chain teaches her to be controlled, and Incubus teaches her to be uncontrolled. Makes sense, she’ll need both. I wonder how much either is aware of the other’s work.
I wonder too. “As we practiced!” Incubus said. Can White Chain not know that Allison has a Ten Cubit Spear? It would produce a mighty bulge in her shorts…
Evil, Manipulative, and Undoubtedly Mad
What better Sifu could one ask for?
Its why I counsel up and coming fighters to seek out devils to teach them.
If they survive the experience they are no doubt going to be powerful beyond measure, for they understand that the battlefield, like their training, is chaos and only a fool attempts to bring that chaos completely under control through over reliance on technique.
’tis the wisdom of the Knights Belligerent for the student to slay the master, or for them to at least aspire to do so. They treat this serial treachery as a form of refinement, removing impurities in their lineage’s technique with each generation usurped. The masters are correspondingly brutal, so as to safeguard their tradition from being polluted by inferiors. Truly, this results in one of the most rewarding teacher-student relationships i’ve ever had the pleasure of witnessing(and subsequently corrupting and devouring).
It is ever a source of pleasure when an apprentice fails to attempt to destroy their teacher. Also disappointment. One cannot have everything.
Pssst… you nearly made me use 10% of my power!
You hate to see it happen.
Note the Atum pouring from the sites she was pierced by Mottom.
When a name title is longer than the post … but meaningful still.
Just like Mammon!
WRONG! Allison is nothing like Mammon! Mammon is far beyond her, and His Atum is as well.
Aye, Allison has yet to rot from the inside out under the weight of incalculable regret.
I recall from my days as a banker that there exists a regulation in certain localities requiring a license for the possession and use of kneecaps, and said license may be revoked at the discretion of any local or multiversal authority (such as myself, who governed fiefdoms in several universes of the Great Wheel).
I still may yet have the authority to revoke such a license, and enforce the confiscation of the licensed materials.
Hush Draco, you may have the legal power to do so, but I know for a fact that you can’t afford the proper bureaucratic bribes necessary to enforce that authority.
Yeah, my first thought was that it’s no wonder her wounds have never healed but scarred instead, if she still projects them in her dreamscape and sweats her essence through them. Her body would have needed a full rest, including in her deep sleep, for them to heal.
Her wounds are like the holes on White Chain’s body.
If Incubus’s blood was molten gold, like mine used to be, Allison would be dead by now.
I SEE YOU SURVIVED, BEANCOUNTER, DESPITE THE VIOLENCE I VISITED UPON YOU WHEN LAST WE MET. TRUTHFULLY, I THOUGHT YOU WOULD. IT SEEMS THE MEMORY OF THE NOBLE METALS THAT ONCE PERVADED YOUR FORM HAVE NOT YET LEFT YOU, EVEN IF THE METAL ITSELF HAS.
IT SEEMS YOUR WORDS FROM WHEN WE LAST SPOKE MIGHT RING MORE TRUE THAN EITHER OF US REALIZED.
I’m afraid death and I are, and will remain, loose acquaintances at best. But it was not the memory of my precious blood that allowed my survival; rather my continued existence (I refuse to call it “life” at this point) is owed to my lowliness.
You left me in a wretched state, unrecognizable as a living thing. But fool that you are, you failed to notice that, in fact, this is just what I look like all the time. I escaped death by feigning total annihilation! If only by the skin of my eyeballs, I still yet draw breath, and I shall continue to steal in this elevator! Joubes Draco, former Regional Manager at the Bank of the Grand Dragon, may be destroyed, but he shall not die!
I offer you my humble greeting Joubes Draco, esteemed ex Bank Manager. In response to your earlier enquiry, Idiot is my calling and Idiot indeed i am.
I am certain that a banker such as yourself, even after dismissal and in somewhat reduced straits, would have no interest of any kind in my recent misfortune regarding missing lift cages, nor of the revelations of my subsequent investigations, namely that a number of ‘recently retired’ elevator cars and a quantity of good cable were recently received at the premises of one H King, dealer in scrap metal and general recycling, sold by a somewhat down at heel individual who, some days earlier had offered a quantity of molten gold heavily contaminated with spent black glass and of disappointingly inferior quality.
No, i am sure none of this is of any interest to you and i shall trouble you no further on this matter as you doubtless have other, more pressing concerns to attend to, having just publicly referred to a Knight of the Thorns as a fool.
my gods eternal and unblinking, you people are a bunch of NERDS
Huh, so Incubus *was* training her…
Everyone hates dodge tanks.
Is he really even dodging if he isn’t actually there? Or is he merely dodging by several hundred miles?
If I’m guessing right, in this wee-little-bit-symbolic place one drop of blood is no different than one gallon, and not in the “draw first blood” sense.
Then there is the little matter of her marring his perfect pretty face. That could be even worse! These ARE ego fights, no?
I wonder about that. Incubus certainly *seems* vain enough, but his real face is also heavily scared and it doesn’t seem like he’s done anything to correct or hide that. I suspect at least part of his vanity is an act, to mislead and misdirect.
The first cut is the deepest, ya know.
Mauling, skulls-spiked, wrist wound burns
on the cat the tiger turns
Crudelli, climbing, travels, learns?
mhm ….. I honestly dont know what Incubus’ angle is here
‘For the lulz’?
The other demiurges must fall. Solomon is powerful and well consolidated in his worlds. Point the Rising Allison at him and see what happens.
And after thet ?Surely he isnt someone without a plan for the endgame, would he be willing to bhend the knee to the rising King ?
So far, the Sword King’s plan appears to be: use the Rising King and the Red God to avenge his ego upon the rest of the Seven.
Once he’s achieved his vengeance, I doubt he could care less about what happens to himself. The War is the means AND the ends.
He better hurry. Hasn’t Abaddon said there is only one more book after this one?
Speaking as one with slippery tendencies, he may go for the whole shebang. Envy.
Another scar for the scarred sword king.
There’s nothing to fear…for _her_.
That is both means and goal. Such is the art.
Kindly consider,
Pree Al-YISUN’s instructors consist of a continuous nuclear explosion in a suit of ash armor, a fragment of fundamental chaos that lies to the multiverse so well that reality capitulates to her untruths, and an interdimensional overlord glam god.
Pree Al-YISUN makes such interesting friends.
Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely…but it does not *have* to. Power is not an end, but a means. Power for power’s sake will ultimately break the wielder.
Why seek power? To answer this question, the wise man first asks “why do we fight?” The wise man knows that the evil ones fight because they can; the evil ones fight to gain power over others and to exalt themselves forevermore. The evil ones never realize until it is too late that sacrificing all they have for power means that in the end, their selves is all they will ever have left. The more you take, the less you have. This is the Paradox of Power.
But the good ones know why they fight: for home, for family, for peace. They do not seek to exalt themselves, they only wish to make sure their loved ones are safe. When the good people go to war, their souls are at peace. This is the Paradox of War.
The wise ones remember what the Bhodisattva of War Sun Tzu said. “If you wish for peace, you must prepare for war. And you must always remember that the true object of war is peace.” This is the Paradox of Peace.
The wise ones also know that if you do not know yourself nor your enemy, you will succumb in every battle. If you know yourself, but not your enemy, then for every victory you gain, you shall also suffer a defeat. It is only by knowing yourself and your enemy that you will prevail in every battle. This is the Paradox of Self.
Wise speaks the Lawgiver.
This humble Censor shall add one further commentary to this discourse on Power. Why does Power drive the souls of the unwise and self-center mad, rendering them as intractable as rabid dogs?
The sage Orwell once observed that the worst Tyrants seek power for the sake of power…and that the surest way to demonstrate your power over others is to make them suffer.
This then, is the sweet poison that makes the powerful believe that kindness is foul and cruelty good…for even the mightiest of Deitarchs cannot know for sure that their power is unrivaled. When a rival or threat appears, it tears at their hearts. Are they stronger than me? Are they quick in thought or flesh? What Words of Power do they ken?
Their agitated minds cannot rest until they break their rivals in spirit, stamping their faces into the dirt, soothing themselves for a time with the narcotic mantra “Still, I am Supreme.”
And yet Wheel is vast and lit by trillions of little Flames––too many for even the fiercest Demiurge to test, break and control. Thus the forces of Evil never rest, never lie at ease. By using their power to enslave others, thus they become Power’s slave–the Paradox of Power spoken of by the Lawgiver.
What then, would happen if a consciousness knew, deep down, that they were the strongest? If they knew deep down, without any doubt, that no Animal in the Kingdom could ever strike them down?
Such a being may not be wise, or noble, or even clever…but their hearts would bear no hatred or envy, their minds no fevered schemes. They would treat their power as a mere trifle, and reach out to the hearts of others without fear of being hurt by rejection or betrayal.
This would be the mark of true Royalty, expressed through many facets…an Absolute Power that does not corrupt, but rather purifies and brings Absolution.
I appreciate the flaming ponytail of enhanced godhood. Very nice indeed.
Incubus: Ow. Okay, play time’s over.
All that for a drop of blood?
i should not have needed to scroll this far down to find this.
One could find themselves greatly rewarding for drawing a drop from a Demiurge
Fuucck him up, Allison!!!